


To Fight, To Win

by anneapocalypse



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Caesar's Legion, Gen, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-28
Updated: 2012-06-28
Packaged: 2019-01-29 14:45:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12633240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anneapocalypse/pseuds/anneapocalypse
Summary: A Ranger waits. A Ranger fights. A Ranger survives.





	To Fight, To Win

**Author's Note:**

> Rated M for slavery and mentions of violence.
> 
> Written for tofunction on tumblr.

She’s won every fight yet.

She should be counting. That’s what prisoners are expected to do - count. Count days, count hours, count fights, count wounds.

Instead, she wraps her hands, by the dusty shafts of sun slipping in through the chinks in the prison barracks. Torn strips of NCR drab to strengthen her bruised knuckles, before a guard steps in to haul her back to the ring, which could happen at any time. There’s no time to heal. Only to fight. To live.

Stella doesn’t count fights, or kills, or days. She’ll start counting when she’s free, when every morning she doesn’t wake up a Legion prisoner will be its own victory.

For now, she wraps her hands.

Somewhere, a slave howls at the strike of a whip and she sets her teeth and refuses to count the lashes.

She is not a slave. A prize, but no slave. Caged, but not collared.

Tying the cloth ends in a ragged knot, she lets her breath out, leans back against the wall, to rest, but not to relax, not to retreat her senses. A Ranger stays alert. A Ranger watches, a Ranger listens, a Ranger waits. This too is a fight, against impatience. For now, just watch. For now, fight. For now, live.

The opportunity will come. And when it does, she will seize it.

Footsteps approach the prison barracks. Legion guards. Come for her. The ring awaits. Stella flexes her hands, collects a steadying breath, and waits. To fight. To live. To win.


End file.
